Out-Law / Your Daily Need-To-Know

Palm announces new portal without owning the domain name

23 Nov 2000, 12:00 am

Palm Inc., the company behind the popular personal digital assistants, appears to have made the mistake of launching a new portal called MyPalm without first obtaining a suitable domain name. Subsequent to announcing the name of its new service, it has written to the owner of MyPalm.com labelling him a cybersquatter and demanding that he transfer the name.

Dominic Hulewicz of Windsor, England, registered MyPalm.com in December 1999, almost a year before Palm decided on the name for its new portal. He uses the domain name for e-mail only, originally for his Palm PDA, and he has posted a web page to clarify that his site is not the home of the MyPalm portal. The domain name MyPalm.org appears to be operated as an unofficial Palm user group in Germany. The name MyPalm.net is apparently registered to a New Hampshire individual, Sangita Goplani. Palm Inc.’s service is currently operating from Palm.net.

According to TheRegister.co.uk, Hulewicz has received a Cease and Desist order from Palm Inc. However, Hulewicz is reported as saying that he has never attempted to sell his domain name or solicit any offers for it and is refusing to transfer the name.

John MacKenzie of OUT-LAW.COM said:

"If Palm do try to take this further, it will be interesting to see how the courts treat Mr Hulewicz. The courts should have some sympathy for him, as there is a general rule that you cannot protect a name retrospectively. Equally, there seems to be no confusion created, as he makes it clear on his web site that the site is not Palm Inc. and gives a link to their site. Confusion and competition are likely to be the central elements of any claim that Palm are going to make."